Introduction:



Experiences from the past.
(Colonial and co federal period)

a) Some states had the experience of executive councils made up of several members , a system which had been followed with considerable success by the Swiss for some years and Benjamin Franklin argued that a similar system be adopted by the United States.

b) Most of the members of the constitutional convention still remembered that excess of executive power wielded by the British Monarch.




Options Available at that time:

a) Hereditary Monarchical System: One option was to adopt the hereditary system for the election of the chief executive of the United States on the same lines as was present in Britain at that time.



Reasons against the first option:
1) The Americans are liberal by nature. They resented the monarchical system. They wanted a progressive executive.

2) The theory of separation of powers and system of checks and balances was a part of the US constitution. The monarchical system was against the basic spirit of the US constitution.

3) At the time when the Americans were to decide through convention, the nature of their executive , the British Monarchy was losing its powers and functions and giving way to democratic institutions.

According to Wills G. Swartz:
“Our republican form of government with its elective presidency was born in the declining period of divine right absolutism.”



b) Parliamentary Representative system: Second option was to adopt the parliamentary representative system in which Prime Minister is the chief executive.



Reasons against the 2nd Option:
1) Theory of checks and balances is a part of the US constitution but the parliamentary system is against the basic spirit of the US constitution.

2) Theory of separation of powers is a part of the US constitution but in the parliamentary system, the chief executive (P.M) is under the influence of the legislature.





Deliberations of the constitutional convention about the system of election:


I. Legislature election: The framers of the constitution discarded the legislature election because in this method the president would be subservient to the legislature.

II. Popular Election: The framers also rejected the popular elections because this would give advantage to the larger states.



Final decision about the method of election:

In theory: In theory the US constitution provides for an indirect election by an electoral college constituted for the election of the president


In practice: with the growth of the political parties in America, the system today has become direct.





Qualification of presidential candidate:

A US presidential candidate must full fill the following conditions:
i. Must be a natural born US citizen .
ii. Must be at least 35 years of age.
iii. Must have lived in the country for at least 14 years.




Tenure: According to the constitution the president should office for a term of 4 years and under the 22nd amendment, a president can stand for reelection only once.




Impeachment: If the president commits a serious crime or an act of grass misconduct, he can be removed from office by a process of impeachment initiated in the congress.





Actual Election Process:

The election is held after every four years in a leap year
 On the first Tuesday
 After the first Monday
 In the month of November




Nomination of candidates:

The process of nominating candidates by the two major parties begins many months earlier. The first consideration before them is to select a candidate who would win votes. The voting behavior of the American people is determined by various factors which change from time to time.



Election Campaign:

After this the election campaign begins which is a process of greatest magnitude both in terms of number of people involved and the amount of money spent. This process, at present, costs the country more than 1 billion dollars.



Voting Stage:

Actually the people of each state don’t vote directly for the president and the vice-president. They select presidential electors equal to the number of senators and republicans each state has in the congress. The candidate with the highest number of electoral votes in any state wins all the votes of that state. The presidential electors of all the 50 states and the district of Columbia (federal area) a total of 538 comprises what is known as the electoral college. Here it must be noted that 535 electors are from all the 50 states and 3 from the district of Columbia.



Constitutional Requirement of Electoral College:

 It never meets as a body.
 The electors meet at their respective state capitals and cast their votes shortly before the election. To win a candidate needs 270 votes.
 The constitution further provides that if no candidate wins the majority, the members of the House Of Representatives would make the decision.




Process in the HOR:
 All the members of the states would vote as a unit.
 All the 50 states and the District of Columbia would be allowed one vote each (50+1).
 To win a candidate needs at least 26 votes.




Conclusion / Assessment of the election process:

1) The Americans had experienced in the past a strong colonial executive and a weak local legislature. They wanted to strike a balance between the two. Therefore they chose an executive known as president. The unique feature of this executive authority is that the congress does not have any power in his election as separate Electoral College is constituted for this purpose and get dissolved after the election.

2) With the growth of political parties in America, party influences are immense during the election campaign from nominating candidates, to selection of the electors and to the stage when actual voting takes place.


According to Lord Bryce:
“The president is the nearest and the dearest substitute of a royal ideal which the Americans possess.”

3) It is believed that due to the party influences the president does not play a natural role but tries to strengthen the position of his party through favorable governmental politics.

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